by requiett » Thu Jul 30, 2009 8:35 am
I thought it over for a few minutes and visualized what you're after. I think it can actually be done with the built-in AE shatter effect. Get this:
You have your character mask/cutout/subject explode into a shatter mask. You'll probably want to slow the speed of the shatter explosion down toward the edges for effect, and it'll probably look better if you use a lot of small particles.
Then create you create the bars you want in PS, etc. Take the same shatter effect you applied to the character and apply it to a separate shatter composition with the bars. Be sure to keep all the variables the same (seed, speed, etc). You then export that into a lossless AVI, reimport it, and REVERSE the footage and line up the shatters, and have it fade in over the character, so it will seem like the particles are reassembling.